If You Build It, Will They Come?
Lynn Ivey’s unshakeable commitment to her cause has come down to this. Three and a half years after she has left her bank job, she and I are sitting in the high-ceilinged main room of The Ivey, her sparkling $4.5 million adult daycare facility. Although it is midday, we are nearly alone in the center. Only a couple of staff members are around to care for the two clients who have signed up so far.
We’re taking a break from another tough meeting about The Ivey’s dire financial situation. Lynn, two key investors, her attorney, her accountant, and I have worked through the morning, playing out various revenue and expense scenarios. Although the fire has not left Lynn’s eyes, it’s been a morning of grimaces and long faces. With virtually no sales after nine months of marketing to prospective members, she is in danger of running out of money within six months. Her expense base is weighty, due to the high-end nature of the facility, her passionate attention to every detail, and the fact that she must keep a minimum professional staff on board to meet regulatory requirements.
We talk about what has been learned over the past year. Lynn had projected a sold-out center at this point in time and had invested significant resources into promoting the facility—direct and indirect marketing campaigns, including reaching out to referral sources like geriatricians, in-home care services, assisted-living facilities, and the like. While the pipeline of interested prospects has buzzed with activity, the number of families scheduling tours has amounted to a trickle.
“Oh my god. I almost forgot,” she says with a self-deprecating laugh. “You won’t believe what I did this weekend. My nurse, Betsy, rented my favorite movie of all time, Field of Dreams, and I must have watched it three or four times. I had forgotten some of the scenes, and I couldn’t believe how perfect it is for what I’m doing here.” I ask her what scenes were most on target.
“Remember James Earl Jones at the edge of the baseball field, his speech to Ray when the bank’s about to foreclose on his house? It’s perfect.” She peels back a few pages on a worn white legal pad and begins to read aloud from James Earl Jones’s famous speech, only this time he’s talking about The Ivey. He’s describing how customers will come for reasons they can’t understand; how they will drive from miles around and knock on the front door; how they will hand over their money, innocent as children, in search of peace and comfort, and hungry for the past.
As I listen, I feel a gut-wrenching mix of admiration for Lynn’s resilient faith and deep concern for the facts on the ground. I’m thinking about all that is at stake here, quite a few jobs and lots of money, but mostly Lynn Ivey’s dream of taking care of families in need and her attempt to honor the mother who had taken such great care of her.
If there is a god of startups, how can this venture fail?
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